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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25085536">since the flood</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/mikapim/pseuds/mikapim'>mikapim</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Hannibal (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>M/M, Masturbation, Post-Episode: s02e13 Mizumono, Will Graham is a Mess, Will jerks off in Hannibal's bed: the fic, slightly angsty</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 04:28:03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,669</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25085536</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/mikapim/pseuds/mikapim</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Will Graham doesn't intend to make a habit out of visiting Hannibal Lecter's home, months after Hannibal has slit him open and left him for dead. He <i>certainly<i> doesn't intend to sleep in Hannibal's bed.</i></i></p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Implied Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>115</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>since the flood</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>content warnings:<br/>-canon character death, general mizumono sadness, will miserably jerking off</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>The house, always rather gothic, seems more foreboding than it ever had before- even when Will had first been invited for dinner at Dr. Lecter’s and couldn’t shake the remnants of discomfort around class disparity as he shuffled his awkward, scruffy self into the foyer, unclear at why Hannibal had wanted him there at all. It wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling- Will had gone to grad school, after all- and, in regard to Hannibal, it faded into insignificance fairly quickly. Hannibal was able to make Will uncomfortable in ways far beyond his wealth could.</p><p>Similarly, Hannibal was strange in ways beyond his obvious wealth so much that it often distracted from it. Occasionally, in less generous moments, Will would look around Hannibal’s house and feel as if he was seeing a space designed by a particularly morbid and classically inclined child- there was no restraint in the decorating of Hannibal Lecter’s home, no limit to the skulls and taxidermy, no moderation in the use of demanding colors. It was a concept that landed easily with the Hannibal Will had known- thought he’d known- before he saw Hannibal for what he truly was. Of course the Hannibal that was Will’s eccentric quasi-psychiatrist and almost-friend would have a ostentatious, close to obnoxious home. The more Will got to actually know Hannibal, the more the house felt like a facade. Well, pardoning the kitchen. Will had always liked the kitchen, liked seeing Hannibal in easy control over his dominion.</p><p>Will stands outside the house, where he had found Alana, broken and bleeding. ‘Jack’s inside’, she had said. Will had spent hours wondering why she hadn’t mentioned Abigail. Some part of him, buried down bitter in his gut, believes maybe things would be different if she had. If Will had known Abigail was still alive, going into the house, maybe he wouldn’t have been so shell-shocked. Maybe he would’ve been able to talk Hannibal down, maybe they could’ve-</p><p>There’s crime scene tape up, but that’s about it. Freddie’s gotten her pictures already, though Will hasn’t seen them, only hearing about it second hand. When Will drove over, he thought he might have to make a call to convince someone to let him into the house, for some divine profiler reason. Apparently, it wasn’t that much of a priority. The door isn’t even locked.</p><p>Will breathes in shakily. He had been anticipating difficulty, maybe even it being impossible. He considers going home, even turns around- only to see Abigail, standing a few steps away from him. Sometimes she looks as she did as she died in his arms, the final time, hair tied back and blood splattered against her face. Sometimes, like now, she looks older than anyone ever got the chance to know her, an odd certainty in her posture he doesn’t recognize as her own. Rarer still she looks as she did when they first met, so perilously young and scared but mostly intact. Will isn’t sure which breaks his heart more.</p><p>Abigail smiles a little, it not reaching her eyes. “I’ll go inside with you, if you want. It would probably be beneficial for me too.” Will isn’t sure how beneficial he is intending this to be for himself, much less her.</p><p>“I think I need to be alone for this. For now,” Will says to her, genuinely apologetic and embarrassed for it. He knows he <em>is</em> actually alone. He <em>knows</em> she isn’t really there.</p><p>Abigail nods, eyes still distant but understanding. She’s much more lenient with him in his mind than she was when she was alive.</p><p>Will turns back to the door. The sun is hot on his back. The smell of rainwater floods his senses.</p><p>***</p><p>Will doesn’t intend to make a habit out of it, but it is cathartic in some ways, to be where Hannibal once was, to be where everything had gone so horribly wrong. Sometimes Abigail comes inside the house with him. (On one occasion, Alana shows up as well, and it takes Will half the conversation to realize he’s talking to an actual person for once- it doesn’t exactly go well). Mostly Will and Abigail sit in silence together, but they do talk- conversations rotating from the mundane to the serious so quickly it occasionally leaves Will blindsided. Sometimes it’s even lighthearted when they talk about Hannibal, making fun of him for his decor and fussiness, though Abigail is much more forgiving toward him. She and Hannibal always did have more similar tastes, after all.</p><p>Abigail takes Will upstairs once, showing him a room Will had never been in before. It takes a moment before it clicks and even though Abigail never explicitly says ‘this was my bedroom’, the truth of it strikes Will like a club. Flannery O'Connor on the nightstand, cds and a pair of blue headphones on the desk, a small sweater hanging off the end of the bed.</p><p>“Were you ever here?” Will hears himself asking, unable to stop the words from coming out. “Were you here while-” <em>While I was downstairs, hating myself for not hating him for killing you</em>.</p><p>Abigail doesn’t respond, but the answer is obvious in her eyes. Will is aware, on some level, what it means that the answer comes so easily to her, this facsimile of her. Aware that it means that he knew before he even asked.</p><p>He suddenly has to get out of the room- he slams the door behind him but doesn’t get any further than the upstairs hallway before he collapses with the intensity of the realization, suddenly shaking and unable to get his legs to move beneath him. He doesn’t fall asleep, or rather fall unconscious, but he is stranded on the floor for a long time. When he finally is able to jerk his eyes open, Abigail is nowhere to be seen.</p><p>Will feels like he had when he had to come off the strongest of the painkillers- nauseous from pain and disconcerted by the disconnect between his body and his mind. He barely knows what he’s doing as he seeks out another room, crawling on his hands and knees, and pulls himself up into the bed. The comforter is cool and he buries his face into it.</p><p>He does fall asleep then, only barely aware of a twinge in his mind telling him that there is something deeply wrong about where he is.</p><p>He doesn’t stay asleep for long, not even long enough for nightmares to set in. Long enough, however, for him to wake up confused and concerned about where he is. The first thing he sees when he opens his eyes is a statue of a monk on a pedestal, and even though the pain in his head is certainly not something that’s followed him into a dream before, he doesn’t know how else to explain that. But the rest of the room clears in his vision- deeps blues and purples, one too many skulls to be classified as normal, a fireplace across from the bed with a conspicuously angled mirror hanging over it. He’s at Hannibal’s house. He’s in Hannibal’s bedroom, which he certainly hasn’t been in before, but there is no longer any question in his mind that that’s where he is. He groans loudly, eyes slipping shut. Will tries to get out of the bed- he really, truly wants to- but his listless limbs do not corroborate with him.</p><p>“Rest, Will.”</p><p>Hannibal’s voice is so clear in Will’s ears that Will forces his eyes open to scan the room, but finds it empty. He doesn’t know how to classify the feeling in his gut, but it’s something close to disappointment.</p><p>Will isn’t doing this. He can't be. He isn’t going to sleep in Hannibal’s bed. He isn’t-</p><p>Will sleeps.</p><p>***</p><p>The six hours he spends in Hannibal’s bed, Will acknowledges with a grim sense of acceptance, is the best sleep he's had since before he woke up in the hospital with a ruined life and a scar on his stomach. He explains it away at the time as a consequence of pure exhaustion, but he knows that doesn’t track. He’s been exhausted before, is most of the time, and still doesn’t sleep like that. It isn’t long until desperation kicks in.</p><p>Will drives to Baltimore and parks a few blocks away from Hannibal’s house. Abigail appears beside him and they walk to the house- Will knows he’s going to ask her to leave before he goes inside this time, but wants to be with her for a few minutes beforehand. Abigail tells him about how she made squirrel jerky as a child as a precursor to bigger game- Will doesn’t tell her that he ate squirrel as a child too, but it was more out of desperation than sport.</p><p>Abigail leaves Will at the front door. Will, hopelessly tired and with no one to prove himself to, goes straight upstairs.</p><p>Everything is as it was- the bed is slightly rumpled from Will’s last nap. Will tries to not think too much about what he’s doing as he takes his pants off and pulls back the comforter and topsheet to slip under them. It’s very cool- it’s not like anyone is paying for electricity anymore- and not as soft as Will had been expecting. For a brief moment, Will thinks this was all an extremely stupid mistake and is about to put his pants back on and go home, but then the telltale heaviness in his eyelids forces him into a long blink.</p><p>Will doesn’t mean to imagine a hand brushing his hair back from his forehead, pressing into the side of his face, gently touching his eyelids. He doesn’t mean to imagine a voice, deep and accented, saying something to him he doesn’t understand.</p><p>Will sleeps deeply, and somehow doesn’t have nightmares.</p><p>Will does, however, wake up with an achingly hard cock. It’s been so long and the situation is so shocking it takes Will a second to even fully realize what's happening.</p><p>“Jesus Christ,” Will says to himself, annoyed and still lethargic with exhaustion despite his nap. He’s pretty sure he hasn’t gotten hard at all since waking up in the hospital- the injury and depression leaving him incapable of it even once the medication had worn off.</p><p>He looks around the room, feeling particularly uninspired sexually by what he’s seeing. <em>It’s just because it’s the first good sleep I’ve had in months</em>, Will thinks to himself. He almost believes it.</p><p>Will tries his best to ignore his arousal and just go back to sleep. He shifts uncomfortably for a few moments, getting sweaty even in the cold. Finally he shifts onto his stomach, which is probably the worst decision he’s made yet.</p><p>It’s so easy then, to jerk against the bed a little, to press a hand into his boxers. To wrap a hand around his cock, to rub up on the head and feel slick, to force his frustrations into the rapid movement of his wrist.</p><p>“Oh, God,” he says, loud in the quiet room. In <em>Hannibal’s</em> quiet room. “Oh, fuck.”</p><p>It’s largely mindless at first, until images and phantom sensations slip into Will’s thoughts. He can’t even recognize them at first- it’s what he fell asleep thinking about: hands, warm and heavy, on his face. Will is willing to admit his jerk-off fantasies are generally more intellectual than inherently sexual, especially for a man, but the ‘hands tenderly touching his face thing’ is not something he’s gotten off to in the past. No one has ever even touched him like that before, except for Ha-</p><p>Will chokes on a moan, his hand working his cock even as he tries desperately to think of anything else. Fucking, getting his dick sucked, beautiful women, hell, even men that aren’t fucking Hannibal.</p><p>It’s impossible- Will would never say he knew what Hannibal smelled like, but suddenly, with his face pressed into Hannibal’s pillow, he knows it intimately, and it’s making him sigh and force his face harder against the pillow. He tries to chase the thoughts from his mind as he simultaneously tries to chase his orgasm, the two desires streaming through his brain. Will feels out of control, monstrous, brutish- not a thought he’s having or action he’s taking seems to be a conscious decision.</p><p>Will thinks of the last time he saw Hannibal. He had looked so fucking sad that night, so furious, and he had touched Will so tenderly, held onto Will so tightly after he stabbed him, <em>entered</em> him. Will shifts his weight to his shoulders so he can get his free hand to where gauze is still covering the wound on his stomach. He likes to touch it, and hates himself for it- he knows a self-soothing technique when he sees one, even when it’s a fucked up one he’s accidentally adopted for himself.</p><p>It’s too easy, face down on Hannibal’s bed, face shoved into his pillow, to imagine Hannibal behind him. Entering him again, <em>stabbing</em> him, touching his face and his lips and his hair, so gently. Even in the worst of it, in the worst moments of Will’s life, Hannibal had been so gentle. Will wants it. Everything he has ever considered about himself to be true be damned, <em>Will wants it</em>. He wants Hannibal.</p><p><em>He left you</em>, Will thinks, chastising himself even as he lifts his hips up so he can jerk himself off easier. <em>You wanted him, and he fucking left you. He left you, he left you, he left you.</em></p><p>Will comes, and beyond the most carnal gratification of build-up and release, there is no pleasure in it. He pants into the pillow, feels suffocated, and jolts himself out from under the sheet onto the ground. There’s come on his hand and thighs and on the bed, and now the floor-<em> oh shit</em>, he realizes, <em>I’ve got to clean this up.</em></p><p>Will has been humiliated by Hannibal before, surely, but he isn’t sure he’s ever felt it as brutally as he does as he wipes his own come off the ground on his hands and knees. Embarrassingly and near-hysterically, he feels tears smart in his eyes as he does it.</p><p>He gets dressed once he’s cleaned the best he can, but finds himself unable to leave the room. He never got to see Hannibal’s bedroom, before. He wouldn’t have wanted to, beyond a vague passing curiously. Will didn’t like being touched, before. He especially didn’t want to be touched so gently by a man, by a psychiatrist, by a fucking cannibal serial killer who tortured him, manipulated him, made him kill, ruined his life, killed Abigail right in front of him-</p><p>Hannibal would likely never see this room again. He would never know what Will had done in it, would never know how Will sought solace in him even now, after everything. <em>Forgiveness</em>, Will thinks, <em>does not so easily fall in line</em>. His body, aching and still healing, has already forgiven Hannibal, after all. Will isn’t there yet.</p><p>***</p><p>It’s a couple of weeks later- it’s getting cooler now. Will opens the door to let the dogs out. They rush past Abigail, who is standing on the porch. She’s been absent lately- Will knows it’s because his mind has been otherwise occupied and feels guilty for it.</p><p>She turns back to look at Will. “Are we going to Hannibal’s?”</p><p>“Not today. Not anymore.” Will watches the dogs chase each other and piss on dead grass. It’s gonna hurt, saying goodbye to them. He looks at Abigail- she’s older again today, hair wavy and expression eager. The wind smarts Will’s fingertips- he has a brief, delusional moment of wanting to offer Abigail gloves to protect her own. “Come to the shed, I want to show you something.”</p><p>“A boat,” Abigail says, once they get to the shed, suddenly sounding apprehensive. “We’re not going to fly?”</p><p>“I need time. I need to make sure I’m ready, when I see him.” Will says. “Forgiveness is a process.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>this turned out 100% less angsty and 100% more horny than i ever intended</p><p>re: the title, tiktok made me listen to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UbMlcwYwBjc">this song</a> too much and now it just makes me think of w/h</p></blockquote></div></div>
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